TEHRAN, Iran, June 23, 2009
Iran Clerics Rule Out Election Annulment
Guardian Council, The Top Electoral Authority, Says "No Major Fraud Or Breach," Vote Results Will Stand
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Play CBS Video Video Protest Rallies Halted About a thousand young people tried to rally in one of Iran's main public squares. However, a huge number of police and paramilitary dispersed them before they could march. Elizabeth Palmer reports.
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Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei casts his ballot for the presidential elections in Tehran, Iran, June, 12, 2009. (AP/Iranian Student News Agency)
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Photo Essay Iran Protests and Rallies Anti-government protests continue in Tehran and around the world.
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Who's Who Iran's Election: Key Players A look at the most important figures in Iran's contested presidential election.
Iran's state TV reports the country's top electoral authority has ruled out annulling the results of the disputed June 12 election in which President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was named the winner.
A spokesman for the Guardian Council, Abbas Ali Kadkhodaei, was quoted by Iran's state-run English language Press TV as saying Tuesday that the organization had found "no major fraud or breach in the election."
"Therefore, there is no possibility of an annulment taking place," he said.
Ahmadinejad's main challenger, Mir Hossein Mousavi, has charged the election was a fraud and insists he is the true winner. His followers have been staging near-daily rallies. In recent days, the government has intensified a crackdown on the protests.
Mousavi has called for an independent probe, alleging the Guardian Council is not neutral and has already indicated support for Ahmadinejad.
IranWatch: Track the latest on the Iran election upheaval.
Iran's conservative Mehr news agency reported Monday that the Guardian Council's findings would be released on Wednesday.
The Council, an unelected body of 12 clerics and Islamic law experts close to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, finished examining all the complaints filed at the start of this week, according to Mehr.
With Tuesday's announcement, Iran's regime appeared to be closing another door to compromise. Iran's supreme leader had already praised Ahmadinejad as the winner and ordered post-election protesters off the streets.
Riot police cracked down anew on demonstrators in Iran's capital on Monday hours after the feared Revolutionary Guard threatened to crush any further post-election protests.
Security forces used tear gas and fired live bullets in the air to break up a group of about 200 protesters paying tribute to a young woman whose apparent shooting death was captured on video and circulated around the world.
Such threats and the deaths of at least 17 people since the start of the protests have prompted growing concern by the international community about the fate of opposition supporters. In New York, U.N. Secretary Ban Ki-moon urged an "immediate stop to the arrests, threats and use of force," U.N. spokeswoman Michele Montas said at U.N. headquarters Monday.
The announcement by the Guardian Council came a day after it said - in a rare acknowledgment - that there had been voting irregularities in 50 districts, including local vote counts that exceeded the number of eligible voters. However, the council said the discrepancies were not widespread enough to affect the result. The council agreed last week to investigate opposition complaints of problems in the voting.
© MMIX, CBS Interactive Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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- Who can't believe Ahmajerk won? His rallying his crowds of supporters for protests in support of his victory have been awesome...not.
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- Imagine voting for the USA's Republicon Guard all along with your head up your southern fatass?
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- Ha, if "teleprompter" is all the venomous, god-delusional, Repigswine have against President Obama, then I'm looking forward to the replay of 2008 in 2012.
The tough question for the RepigletNazis is going to be, who are they going to choose to take the political death of running against one of the best presidents the USA has ever seen? - Reply to this comment
- 1. Obama has been president for FIVE months. So how did he "waste SIX months" waiting for the election?
2. Iran ALREADY HAS the capability for nukes. That capability came about under Bush's regime, but you aren't crying about that, are you?
3. Obama isn't supporting the protests, because it's NOT in America's best interests.
4. The protesters won't get CLOSE to the oil fields, because they are PEACEFULLY protesting. They're not an out-of-control mob.
5. What did Obama vote "present" on, regarding Iran?
6. How is Obama supposed to "take advantage of a weakened regime in Iran"? What would you like him to do?
7. "Teleprompter"? Seriously?
...............................................
This is a typical Liberal response to putting a flower in a rifle barrel and not expecting a bullet to come out. There is some truth in the statement though, but very very little. They are in an alternate universe somewhere smoking pot or something.... - Reply to this comment
- If we commit troops to another failed attempt at 'regime change' then we might as well commit suicide.
So why embarras ourselves more then we have already by shouting 'empty threats'?
Wall Street/City of London that makes up the British Empire needs chaos and war more then ever to fuel speculation in oil and the stock market.
Folks we have to connect these damn dots and quit laughing at the consipiracy theories that are REAL!
Wall Street/City of London can't function with no speculation, so it has to artifically create it through chaos, war, and false commodity shortgages
It's the British way, a motto perfected by the Rothschilds.
OUR ENEMY IS THE BRITISH EMPIRE...IT MUST BE DESTROYED BEFORE IT DESTROYS CIVILIZATION!!! - Reply to this comment
- Well...now that cries for freedom and democracy fell on deaf ears (no more "tear down this wall" events from America), I guess our liberal leader can now continue his diplomacy efforts with the Mullahs, Supreme Leaders, and "Axis of evil" around the world. Hopefully he has not offended any of these guys by what he said so far and can still cozy up to them. His experience with Bill Ayers and Rev. Wright should help in this case. WAKE UP AMERICA!
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- Iran's youth, and educated are done with the theocracy. This is just the beginning, and the Clerics have to know this. They'll either make some sort of concesion,(and no, I don't know what), or they'll become a police state. I'm surprised they havne't taken everyone's cell phones...yet...
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- As I look at Khamenei's picture casting a ballot I visualize the hundreds of thousands likely bussed in to voting places to vote for Ahmajerk. The bussing in of supporters just like in the old Soviet Union..Wow what a showcase of democracy that was! The Mullahs have won the battle but not the War on dictorship.
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- 800 Republicons now on the USA's terrorist list. The Nazi Rifle Association says the list is sham. Sound familiar?
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- And what happens to THOSE responsible for the non-major "breach or fraud?" Oh nothing... how appropriate while those that marched in the street to expose such get drastic consequences. This Theocracy will be an example for the rest of the world for decades to come of how a theocracy cannot truly be democratic.
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- Looks like we will have Pol Pot 2.0 Sorry for this million or that will wind up in mass unmarked graves. They should have waited for a President that really thought that freedom was an inalienable right to everyone.
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- REMEMBER FLORIDA ?!
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- As if the world didn't see this one coming...
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- Iran's excuse for a theocratic "Supreme Court" has ordered there will be no new elections and that "What's His Fuzzy Face" is the winner of Iran's election.
Taking the words out of Supreme Court Justice Scalia's mouth, they are saying "Too Bad! Live with it!!!"
It is obvious that the decision of the neocon Fascist Nazi Supreme Court in Gore vs. Bush in 1999, has been thoroughly studied by the Iranian theocracy and found "inspiration" in Scalia's Fascist babblings!
When a handful of powerful people are able to subvert the laws of the land to serve their own selfish ends and refuses to listen to the will of the PEOPLE, that government ceases becoming a democracy and becomes a dictatorship thinking of the people only as servants of the state and "cannon-fodder" for the country's unending wars!!!!!
I wonder what th authors of the Bill of Rights and the US Constitution would say about that????
HAIL OBAMA???? - Reply to this comment
- This outcome is a very possible result of having 'the' decision determined by an 'electorial college type of gang'. It is clear that people are not important in the decision on who runs things. You look at places like this and wonder, but the government says 'trust me'. I guess the Iranians just got fed up with all the lies. Must make them wonder if things were all a lie from the beginning. Go Figure.
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- by despido June 23, 2009 5:53 AM PDT
Obama must be very confused. He wasted 6 months waiting for this 'election' while Iran continued unimpeded toward a nuke. Hoping somehow for a different result, it took 7 days for it to sink in before he seemed to support the protests, which 'surprisingly' are now set in stone. The protestors will now move on the oil fields and drive prices higher. Meanwhile Obama will defend his position of voting 'present' rather than taking advantage of a weakened regime in Iran. Roll out the teleprompter....
Where to start.....
1. Obama has been president for FIVE months. So how did he "waste SIX months" waiting for the election?
2. Iran ALREADY HAS the capability for nukes. That capability came about under Bush's regime, but you aren't crying about that, are you?
3. Obama isn't supporting the protests, because it's NOT in America's best interests.
4. The protesters won't get CLOSE to the oil fields, because they are PEACEFULLY protesting. They're not an out-of-control mob.
5. What did Obama vote "present" on, regarding Iran?
6. How is Obama supposed to "take advantage of a weakened regime in Iran"? What would you like him to do?
7. "Teleprompter"? Seriously? - Reply to this comment
- by despido June 23, 2009 5:53 AM PDT
Obama must be very confused. He wasted 6 months waiting for this 'election' while Iran continued unimpeded toward a nuke. Hoping somehow for a different result, it took 7 days for it to sink in before he seemed to support the protests, which 'surprisingly' are now set in stone. The protestors will now move on the oil fields and drive prices higher. Meanwhile Obama will defend his position of voting 'present' rather than taking advantage of a weakened regime in Iran. Roll out the teleprompter....
Where to start.....
1. Obama has been president for FIVE months. So how did he "waste SIX months" waiting for the election?
2. Iran ALREADY HAS the capability for nukes. That capability came about under Bush's regime, but you aren't crying about that, are you?
3. Obama isn't supporting the protests, because it's NOT in America's best interests.
4. The protesters won't get CLOSE to the oil fields, because they are PEACEFULLY protesting. They're not an out-of-control mob.
5. What did Obama vote "present" on, regarding Iran?
6. How is Obama supposed to "take advantage of a weakened regime in Iran"? What would you like him to do?
7. "Teleprompter"? Seriously? - Reply to this comment
- by curse914 June 23, 2009 5:44 AM PDT
I am curious why God has "chosen" specific individuals to be his voice and ignores all others.
Why am I obligated to believe that anyone has spoken to God, or speaks for God.
Isn't it ironic that those that "speak directly to god", are also the same people that have ALL of the weapons and control of the military?
Strange how those go hand in hand, isn't it?
(I'm not just talking about Islamics!!) - Reply to this comment
- Iran Clerics Rule Out Election Annulment....
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Obama must be very confused. He wasted 6 months waiting for this 'election' while Iran continued unimpeded toward a nuke. Hoping somehow for a different result, it took 7 days for it to sink in before he seemed to support the protests, which 'surprisingly' are now set in stone. The protestors will now move on the oil fields and drive prices higher. Meanwhile Obama will defend his position of voting 'present' rather than taking advantage of a weakened regime in Iran. Roll out the teleprompter.... - Reply to this comment
- I am curious why God has "chosen" specific individuals to be his voice and ignores all others.
Why am I obligated to believe that anyone has spoken to God, or speaks for God. - Reply to this comment
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